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Forgetting Pearl Harbor

On December 7, 1941, the Imperial Japanese government launched a sneak attack against the United States, striking without warning and scoring a devastating blow against a nation that thought it was at peace.

When asked what he thought the Japanese sneak attack against the US Sixth Fleet had accomplished for the Japanese Imperial war effort, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto offered a surprisingly glum assessment.

It was surprising because the Imperial Japanese Navy had scored an uncompromising victory.

The Japanese strike force had succeeded in destroying five battleships, a minelayer, and had sunk or severely damaged three battleships. One hundred and eighty-eight aircraft were destroyed on the ground, and the US Navy suffered 2,333 dead and 1,139 wounded.

By contrast, Japan’s losses were negligible: five midget subs, 29 aircraft and 64 men. Instead of jumping for joy at the victory, Yamamoto said instead, “I fear that all we have accomplished is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”

On December 7, 1941, the United States was nowhere near ready for war. It’s fleet was antiquated, its military forces were still at peacetime levels, it had no air force to speak of, and those forces that it did have were poorly equipped.

Some new recruits, in the first few months following the attacks, trained using wooden rifles and mock weapons because there weren’t enough to go around.

But Yamamoto was right. The battle cry, “Remember Pearl Harbor” struck deep into the hearts of every American, and the “terrible resolve” it imbued resulted in the utter destruction of the Japanese war machine just over three and a half years later.

On September 11, 2001, forces loyal to Islam launched a sneak attack against US civilian targets within the homeland, using US civilian aircraft as improvised bombs.

Both of the towers of the World Trade Center were destroyed: the 110 story structures collapsed from the heat of the fires, killing 2,752 innocent American civilians — an even greater death toll than those lost at Pearl Harbor.

A second attack, this one launched against the heart of the US military in the heart of the American capital, destroyed a significant part of the Pentagon’s outer wall and killed another 189 Americans.

And yet a third attack, this one aimed at the US Capitol Building, or perhaps the White House, was thwarted by the passengers aboard Flight 93, who forced that plane down into a farmer’s field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

In total, 2, 974 Americans died on September 11, 2001. Unlike Isoroku Yamamoto, the mastermind of this attack, Osama bin-Laden, danced with glee.

According to the Associated Press, “the interview underscored Obama’s commitment to repair relations with the Muslim world that have suffered under the previous administration.” (italics mine)

Just exactly what did the previous administration do to damage relations with the Muslim world, anyway? Oh, yeah. September 11.

But Obama wants to communicate to the Muslim world that now, “America is not your enemy.”

It’s as if Harry Truman gave an interview to a Tokyo newspaper after assuming office with an eye toward repairing the damage done US-Japanese relations by the Roosevelt administration.

In the interview Barack Obama pledged, in essence, not to keep America safe from the Muslim world, but to keep the Muslim world safe from America.

“My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy,” Obama told the Saudi-owned, Al-Arabiya news channel, which is based in Dubai.

Obama said the United States had made mistakes in the past but “that the same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago, there’s no reason why we can’t restore that.”

(“See? The war on terror was America’s fault. But there’s a new sheriff in town. I can do better. I am The One.”)

Obama called for a new partnership with the Muslim world “based on mutual respect and mutual interest.” He talked about growing up in Indonesia, the Muslim world’s most populous nation, and noted that he has Muslim relatives.

Quoting the AP directly, “the new president said he felt it was important to “get engaged right away” in the Middle East and had directed Mitchell to talk to “all the major parties involved.” His administration would craft an approach after that, he said in the interview.”

(Much like the Gitmo policy. Act first, plan later. And the press just loves this guy! But anybody with THIS low an opinion of America can’t be all bad.)

“What I told him is start by listening, because all too often the United States starts by dictating,” Obama told the interviewer. Those Americans! No wonder everybody hates them!

The AP went on, gushing that Obama also said that recent statements and messages issued by the al Qaeda terror network suggest they do not know how to deal with his new approach.

(Who is like unto Obama? And who is able to make war with him?)

“They seem nervous,” he told the interviewer. “What that tells me is that their ideas are bankrupt.”

I’ve heard of short term memory loss but this more than a bit ridiculous. I am all for peace with the Muslim world — heck, I think it is a GREAT idea.

So how’s this for the first step towards us all lighting candles and sharing a Coke together?

You Muslim guys take out the terrorists — so we don’t have to. They’re YOUR terrorists. They’re allegedly corrupting YOUR religion. They are giving YOUR neck of the woods a bad name.

It wasn’t 19 Christian American males between the ages of 17 and 35 that hijacked four commercial aircraft on September 11th. It was 19 Arab Muslim males between the ages of 17 and 35 that murdered 3000 innocent civilians.

The problem isn’t the terrorist detention center at Guantanamo Bay. The problem is the Muslim ideology that creates terrorists so dangerous that Guantanamo Bay is necessary.

The problem isn’t the way that America has prosecuted the war against terrorists. The problem is that the Muslims who watch al-Arabiya are in sympathy with the terrorists.

That sympathy won’t evaporate because Barack Obama heaps the blame on the United States instead of on core Islamic teachings. Instead, it simply confirms to the jihadists that they are right — even the President of the United States can see merit in their cause.

“Ok, we’re dictators and our previous leader was a war criminal. But we mean well. Honest! Let’s be friends. Some of my family are Muslims. Heck, I’m from Indonesia!” Gee, that’s presidential.

I was reading CNN’s analysis of the Obama interview and the reaction from the Muslim world. CNN quoted an Islamabad journalist, Imtiaz Gul: “It’s a good sign of an attempt to reconcile with the Muslim world, to say America wants to reach out to them and not to consider them as an enemy.”

Is your head spinning, too? Until America started getting attacked by the Muslim world, America DIDN’T consider the Muslim world an enemy. Even now, after almost twenty years of attacks by Muslims in the name of Islam against US targets, America STILL doesn’t consider the Muslim world an enemy.

Even after the capital cities of the Muslim world erupted in cheers at the news of the 9/11 attacks, America doesn’t consider the Muslim world an enemy. It ought to. But it doesn’t.

The Muslim world considers America as an enemy. Period. No apologies. That’s just how it is. As they see it, America’s ‘crime ‘against Islam is two-fold.

First, it is guilty of loyalty to Israel. That was the reason given for the fatwa declaring an Islamic jihad against America that kicked off the war on terror. Secondly, America is not under Islamic rule.

When those two conditions are satisfied, Islam will be a peace with America. To believe otherwise requires subscribing to a whole new reality. Like the difference between spinning castles in the air and trying to rent rooms in them.

It is almost as if we are apologizing for September 11. “America made mistakes so let’s just forget the whole 9/11 thing. “

That the interview was seen by the Islamic world as an American attempt to ‘reconcile’ as if America was somehow the aggressor against peace-loving Islam is somewhat sickening.